The Grim Legion

by Kindred Ult

  "How do you people get up so fast?" With no other alternative, Varus jumped onto a nearby house and began running as fast as he could along the roofs of the houses. Even as he ran, though, he realized just what he had done. Now a different cry was being heard all along the town. They were yelling "Vampire."

  "Great, well now I'm really screwed." Varus wished he had time to get clothes and a sheath for his sword, but there might not even be enough time to get out of here alive. He could see all of the beacon fires being lit around the town's walls and knew that the guards were at every conceivable spot. He held his sword in one hand and his shield in the other as he leapt to the house that was closest to the wall. Unfortunately for him, when the town was created it had taken into account vampire's jumping abilities. The walls were at least thirty feet from the house and ten feet taller.

  "Mother of all that is good and holy in this world." He leapt to the house closest to his. "I need to get to that spot." Again, though, the guards had spotted him from the wall, and they were sounding the alarm for all of the others.

  "He's heading South!"

  Even with the forewarning, however, none of the guards could compensate for Varus's speed. He caught the guards next to the vine with the footholds behind it completely by surprise. There were two of them, and he leapt down on them after jumping as high as he could. The first one looked up right as Varus's shield smashed into his face and his neck broke, but the second one ripped his horn from his belt and let out a loud peal before Varus cut off his hand and plunged his sword into his chest.

  "Sorry Frank, Ed." Varus scrambled up the handholds and in an instant he was gone over the top. He was about to start running from the town when an extremely bright light shone down upon him from on the wall. It did not burn him, like he had though it would, but it did let the guards who were undoubtedly there already know exactly where he was.

  "Yea, that would be Gristva, our freakin' old hag mage." As if she had heard him and took offense to that last remark, a large fireball flew down from the wall. He ran as hard as he could and lunged to the ground behind the dead carcass of a tree, which soon caught on fire.

  "Hey Gristva, don't throw fireballs, you might burn down the entire forest!" Varus heard someone call from the walls.

  Despite her raggedy tone, Gristva's voice echoed across the field. "Shut yer' trap youngin'. That vamp's gonna' pay for what he's done!"

  "Holy crap, she's scary." Varus leapt to his feet and sprinted towards the forest line. 'Once I make it there, I'll be fine.' His elation at being so close to freedom was short lived. It lasted until he felt amazing pain flow into his side and heard several sharp whistles pass by him. He looked down at his side, while still running, to see an arrow protruding from it. "I'm so coming back to kill you Gristva." He swore to himself as he passed behind the trees, while the light still tried to find him and arrows imbedded themselves into the ground inches away from him.

  Once he figured he had run a good mile or so, he stopped and broke the arrow in his side before pulling it out of him. He could not tell why, but as the arrow left his body, he felt like his energy returned to him.

  "Oh, that's right, we vampires don't like wood…Do we?" He still staggered though, and he was glad that he had decided to wait through one night and one day before entering the town. He now knew that he just had to avoid direct contact with the sun and he would be fine.

  "Well, I suppose that beats having to carry around a coffin." He chuckled for a moment at his bad joke. He would have tried to find a tree to sleep in, but just then he heard the shouts of the villagers as they pursued him. "Aww, Come on!" He would have to postpone his attempts to chase Demenn until he shook these people off of him. Running off into the distant forest, he looked at himself. He was barely clothed, bleeding from the side, and had to carry his sword and shield in his hands as he ran, but at least he was alive. Well, kind of alive.

  Varus was still running several hours later, and despite his newly gained endurance he was starting to feel fatigued. 'I can't stop running, I need to get such a lead on them that they won't be able to reach me even if they run all day.' Finally though, about an hour before sunrise, he simply could not run any longer. He slowed to a walk, found a tree that had been hollowed out, and slipped inside. In moments he was fast asleep, but even as he fell into another of those strange dreams that he had decided were just what vampires had, the dream ended. Inside his dream Varus looked around fearfully. The entire world was black as pitch, and he could not see anything.

  "What's going on?"

  Oddly enough, a voice answered him, "Varus."

  "Yes?" He figured talking to whoever this could be was still better than those crack dreams.

  "That is your name?"

  "Yep." He still could not figure out why he knew that this was his name. It just was.

  "Are you a vampire?" This voice seemed to like asking rhetorical questions.

  "Yes, I am." Varus was getting a little annoyed.

  "Who turned you into a vampire?"

  Ah, now it was getting to real questions. "A vampire named Demenn. He said that he was class two."

  "Hmm, since you are now one of us, you will come to our city. We will decide then whether you are worthy of being a vampire or not."

  "Wonderful, how will I know how to get there?"

  "You will know. Now, awake."

  Varus woke with a jump that put a dent in the tree he was inside, and made him see stars. He climbed out of the small hole in the tree, and was surprised that he did not feel sore after sleeping in such a cramped place for a good twelve hours. Apparently, he had done a good enough job of eluding the villagers, because he could not hear them.

  'They must have given up once it became dark. Heh, suckers. Now, to find Demenn.' But even as that thought entered his mind he realized how futile it was. The only way he would be able to find Demenn now would be to go all the way back to the town and try to pick up his trail there, which was what he had intended to do before the whole fiasco that had happened. Now, however, the whole town would be on alert, and he could not risk another encounter with those psycho people.

  "Well, I guess there's nothing to do except to go to the vampire city or whatever, and wait for him there," he paused for a moment, looking around him. "Ah, of course, it's this way." He bounded into the forest once again.

  ………………………………………………………………………………………………

  Demenn paused next to the tracks that littered the road and smiled. His quarry obviously thought that no one used the old roads anymore, and was being very carefree about just where his lackeys and he were going. Still, they had the advantage of being able to move at morning, so it would take him almost four weeks before he reached them. He stood up and began running along the road as fast as he could.

  "Wulf, I am coming for you." He whispered quietly to the night air.

  Escalation

  4

  EscalationA crowd was gathering. They formed a large ring around two figures as they strafed back and forth and moved almost constantly in their attempts to subdue each other. One held a sword firmly grasped in one hand and a shield in the other, while the other held a spear with both hands. Both of them were panting now, but neither of them was cut because they both wore thick armor for just such an occasion. At that moment, they had just finished a quick melee, and were now pacing off. They were wary of one another, and none too eager to try their luck again.

  Finally, the one with the spear spun the bladed side forward and charged towards the other with both hands on its shaft. The second one stood in his place until it seemed that the spear would hit him, but at the last second he ducked and shoved his shield up, blocking the spear above him, and stabbed his sword into the chin of the other's helmet. The spear wielder fell back as her helmet fell off, and before she could recover, the swordsman was right next to her. She stuck out with her fist, but he blocked this with his shield and hooked his foot behind her
heel. She fell to the ground with a grunt.

  "Ready to give up yet Sera?" The second fighter took off his helmet and placed his sword at her neck.

  Nasoren rolled her eyes and grabbed the sword. "Of course not Bruce. Death before surrender, you know that."

  Bruce smiled. "Whatever child," he stepped back and used her grip on his sword to pull her to her feet. "You kids just haven't lived long enough to truly appreciate life. If an opponent offers you a chance to escape an untenable situation, you should immediately accept. Better a defeated paladin than a dead one."

  Nasoren let go of the sword and went to retrieve her helmet. "Yea, you say that now Bruce, but everyone talks about how you wouldn't give up that town during the undead invasion way back, even though they gave you the chance to."

  Bruce set his weapons down. "That was different, other lives were at stake, not just my own. Although, you may have a point. I suppose that you'll just have to decide for yourself when the time comes. Only, be forewarned, next time you might not be fighting with wooden swords against an old man who doesn't want to hurt you."

  She held her helmet in one hand and retrieved her piece of wood that functioned as a spear. "Uh-huh, now what I need you to do is tell me how to avoid getting beaten by the move you just used."

  He stroked his gray beard as he thought for a moment. "Well, I suppose extending the spear farther away from your body would help, you shouldn't keep it so close to your body. But what you should really do is not use a spear for close combat. I know we've told you this many times since you got here. Spears just aren't meant for serious close fighting. They are meant for throwing and defensive lines. I've seen you fight with a sword, and you're much better with that. Why are you so determined to use a spear?"

  For a moment, Nasoren looked off towards the west. She did that when she was thinking, Bruce had noticed. Then she turned back to him, put her helmet back on, and held her spear. "So, extend it farther away from my body?"

  "Yep, keeping it close to you when you strike allows the enemy a chance to counter, but attacking farther away from yourself keeps them farther away from you."

  "Okay, want to go again?"

  He laughed and stood up. "No thank you child, the crowd's gone away anyway. You've grown far stronger than you were when you were accepted into our academy three weeks ago, and I'm old. If you really want to get stronger that much, go and work on your archery while reciting the incantations of magic or something, okay?"

  She took off her helmet and began to remove the rest of her armor. "Yes master, I look forward to our next match."

  "As do I."

  Nasoren walked off, and Bruce was going to return to his rooms so that he could bathe and prepare for dinner, but before he could make it off the courtyard, he was stopped by a voice.

  "So, I take it that Nasoren is still growing at an astounding rate then?"

  Bruce turned around to see the commander of the paladins leaning against a stone pillar. "Yes sir, in only three weeks she has grown exceedingly in almost all areas of our arts. Her magical arts and swordsmanship are especially good, but I usually attribute that to her previous training at her hometown and to her tireless training here. She seems to never stop working. It's really quite amazing."

  "She's especially good with a sword you say?" The commander pushed himself off of the pillar and motioned for Bruce to walk with him. "But why is she using a spear? Is it to push herself with an unfamiliar weapon?"

  "In truth, I know not. She trains the most with a spear, and the only reason I've seen her prowess with a sword is that I tested her with all of the weapons. Whenever I question her about such a strange choice of weapon, she always changes the subject of conversation. She truly is a strange girl."

  "And what do you think about her promise to her mother about returning to her hometown after she has been here for two months?"

  "Humph, I personally think that it's dangerous. You heard for yourself the circumstances that caused her to come here in the first place, and she still bears that scar on her cheek. If she were to return too soon after such a traumatic incident and after so little training, then I think that no good could come from it."

  The commander was silent for awhile, and Bruce even thought that he might have finished the conversation, but right as Bruce's quarters came into view, he spoke. "Yes, I agree with you, but we cannot go back on our word now. Regardless, I would like you to focus most of your attention on her training for now. We may not have her for very long, so we need to prepare her for what she may face to the best of our ability."

  Bruce placed his hand on the handle to his door. "Understood sir. I suppose I now have the excuse I've needed for favoring her."

  The commander chuckled and walked away as Bruce entered his room.

  ………………………………………………………………………………………………

  Nasoren pulled back the string of one of the standard bows that were just lying around the archery range. She whispered the words to a spell and the tip of the arrow that was lodged in the bow froze over. She looked at the target out among all of the others and released her hold on the taught bowstring. The arrow flew through the air and embedded itself inside the black ring, only a quarter of an inch away from the red dot in the middle.

  She sighed and pulled another arrow out of the quiver that rested against the fence right next to her. She scanned her mind for spells she hadn't used, and just as she though she had used them all, she remembered one last one. She whispered the syllables and let the string go right as she finished. She was surprised when, instead of heating up the arrowhead, the spell made the entire arrow burst into flames. When it struck the target, the flame quickly spread onto that, until the entire target was burned down.

  "Oops." Nasoren ran over to the burning grass and began to stamp out the fire while casting small water spells over the area. Once it was all over she sat down before falling back, lying on the ground, and looking up at the sky. She began to reminisce about her childhood, but as it always did these days, her train of thoughts eventually and swiftly led to her struggle with Mark and to the face of that vampire. She thought about that vampire, that strange being from her nightmares who had saved her and, in only a few words, had taught her to defend herself. She had no idea what she would do with these abilities she had recently gained, but she knew that she could no longer live life as she always had. She wondered why he had saved her. She wondered why he had not killed her as well. More than anything else, though, she wondered what his name was, and she derided herself for never asking what it was.

  "Why?" She whispered to the dusk sky. As usual, though, the sky had no answer, so she stood up, brushed herself up, and walked back to the Paladin's castle. It was almost time for dinner anyway. She would save these thoughts for later, as always.

  ………………………………………………………………………………………………

  Varus stopped running and leaned against a tree, it was about midnight, and he had been running ever since he had awoken about seven hours ago. He had been travelling almost non-stop for about three weeks now, and every time he slept he had those crazy dreams instead of talking with that person. He had drank several animals while travelling, the best being a deer that he had devoured the other day, which still kept him going until now. Although he sensed that he would have to feed again sometime soon. He marveled at how he grew almost imperceptibly stronger each time he fed.

  'So that's how he was so strong.' He smiled to himself as he thought of ripping Demenn's throat open and feeding off of him. That would have to wait, however, until he had gotten to this Vampire Castle. Every day it felt like he was getting closer to the castle, but he never seemed to reach it. It was getting rather frustrating.

  "Oh well, nothing to do besides keep going I suppose." He pushed himself off of the tree and kept sprinting along the forest trail. He had not run for very long before he felt the castle getting noticeably closer.
This filled him with excitement and he renewed his running.

  "Hey, maybe I'll actually make it to this place before sunrise." Unfortunately, he was so intent on the prize that grew closer with every step that he did not notice the figures that hid behind two trees across his path until he passed them by. Of course, by that time it was too late. One of them grabbed him by the back of his head and slammed him to the ground. He groaned in pain. Pain that was only intensified when the same person dragged Varus's face along the ground for a bit before lifting him up and ramming him into a tree. Varus struggled for a bit, but then two more hands held his arms while the original assailant smashed his face into the tree. Varus ceased his struggles, as blood ran down the inside his throat, and the first one chuckled a bit.